ex-PVP Material Project

In 1970, the United States Department of Agriculture began issuing Plant Variety Protection (PVP) certificates which prohibited the use of the line protected for breeding or production purposes by any other organization. Recently, elite lines developed by commercial seed companies such as Pioneer Hi-Bred or Holden’s Foundation Seeds, and used frequently for subsequent elite inbred production, were released from PVP and many more will be released in the future (Figure 1). Because these ex-PVP inbreds were protected they were previously not allowed to be crossed and evaluated. This represents a unique opportunity to evaluate genotypic and phenotypic variation observed in hybrids from different sources of germplasm.

Because Pioneer Hi-Bred and Holden’s Foundation Seed (Monsanto) both held a large market share during the time period when recently released ex-PVP lines were first introduced, and because they account for the majority of PVP lines (Figure 2), our project focuses on recombining these two germplasm sets. The objectives of this project are to 1) create and evaluate a unique breeding population (Figure 3) derived from Holden’s Foundation Seed and Pioneer Hi-Bred ex-PVP germplasm, 2) select high performing lines within the population for use in academia and industry, and 3) use the breeding population to map quantitative trait loci(QTL) for agronomic traits.

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Funding

Funding for this project is provided in part by the Partnership for Research and Education in Plant Breeding and Genetics at Purdue University: USDA NIFA, Purdue University, DOW Agrosciences.